i play on the ps3 and have this fear of haveing more then one skyrim save file at a time, thinking that if i have more then one save file my game will lag more and will have more glitches and problems. is there any truth to this.? or does haveing more then one save file have no effect on the game at all.

I play on the 360 and only keep 5 save files at any one time. Every 20mins (or when i remember) i use the oldest save file.

I dunno if it's a coincidence or not, but when i had umpteen dozen save files, my game needed more cache clear outs than it did when i only use 5 save files. Others will probably come on and tell you differently, however, i'm simply giving you my experience when it comes to save files. My 360 is one of the new slims. How it works on the PS3 maybe another thing entirely.

i usually keep only 3save files and never had any major problems with game

It's possible...as someone else said, Skyrim has kinda a mind on it's own...and the smallest changes can have pretty big effects in the gameplay.

As an example, some people reported that just by removing the loading screens (replacing them with a black background and removing the fog, in PC obviously) improves load times exponentially. I tried it myself, and it's pretty true (apart from increasing immersion).

So I'd clean up old saves if I were you.

Try and keep your save files as small as possible by deleting items you don't want, and weapons and shields dropped by enemies you kill. You delete things by placing them on dead bodies. When the game cleans up the cell and removes the body it will take all the junk with it.

It's a major pain, but clearing up is the way to go. Even if they sorted the clear up issue, I'd still go into the bodies and remove all weapons and sheilds as i do it without even thinking about it now.

If you're on PC, I highly suggest installing the USKP, as it does that for you (it "merges" the weapons and shields into the enemy's body, and although they are dropped as normal when an enemy is killed, accessing them will access the body instead, and thus they get cleaned up along with the body as well).